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on Resource Economics |
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Issue of 2013‒09‒24
six papers chosen by |
| By: | Wesley R. Brooks; Stephen C. Newbold |
| Abstract: | The impacts on biodiversity and ecosystems are among the key reasons for concern about climate change. Integrated assessment models are the main tools used to estimate the global economic benefits of policies that would address climate change, but these models typically include only a partial accounting and idiosyncratic treatment of ecosystem impacts. This report reviews several recent studies of the impacts of climate change on biodiversity. We also review recent quantitative estimates of the rate of species extinctions, the impact of climate change on biodiversity, and the value of biodiversity loss. Based on these estimates, we re-calibrate the biodiversity loss function in the FUND integrated assessment model, and we develop a new global biodiversity nonuse value function. These could serve as replacements for the functions currently used in FUND, or as a preliminary ecosystem damage function in a new integrated assessment model. We also highlight areas where further research is needed for developing more comprehensive and reliable forecasts of ecosystem damages as a result of climate change. |
| Keywords: | climate change, ecosystem, biodiversity, integrated assessment model, structural benefit transfer |
| JEL: | Q51 Q54 Q57 |
| Date: | 2013–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nev:wpaper:wp201302&r=res |
| By: | Baumann, Florian; Friehe, Tim |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the consequences of an increase in the expected fine for non-compliance with an environmental design standard for an industry with Cournot competition and free entry. Our analysis is quite timely, given recent policy proposals to raise environmental fines. We describe the range in which changes in the environmental fine have no consequences, and detail the various other effects that emerge. It is established that an increase in the expected fine for non-compliance may have adverse welfare consequences, while it always serves the purpose of inducing a greater share of firms to adopt the prescribed technology. -- |
| Keywords: | pollution,regulation,design standard,endogenous number of firms,environmental fines,SEC |
| JEL: | D62 Q55 Q58 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:dicedp:106&r=res |
| By: | Henrique N. S\'a Earp; Ademar R. Romeiro |
| Abstract: | Every production-recycling iteration accumulates an inevitable proportion of its matter-energy in the environment, lest the production process itself would be a system in perpetual motion, violating the second law of Thermodynamics. Such high-entropy matter depletes finite stocks of ecosystem services provided by the ecosphere, hence are incompatible with the long-term growth in the material scale of the economic process. Moreover, the complex natural systems governing such stocks respond to depletion by possibly sudden environmental transitions, thus hindering markets' very ability to adapt to the new equilibrium conditions. Consequently, uncertainty of critical resilience thresholds constrains material economic growth. |
| Date: | 2013–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:1309.2274&r=res |
| By: | Stefano Bosi; Lionel Ragot |
| Abstract: | On the one hand, the adoption of polluting technologies can enhance the factor productivity; on the other hand, pollution lowers the stock of human capital by weakening physical and mental performances, and short-ening the life expectancy at the end. To capture the impact of pollution on economic growth, we compute the optimal policy in an endogenous growth model `a la Lucas (1988) and we study the effects of pollution in the short and the long run. |
| Keywords: | pollution, human capital, endogenous growth |
| JEL: | D90 J24 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:drm:wpaper:2013-25&r=res |
| By: | Edward L. Glaeser |
| Abstract: | Long before economics turned to psychology, environmentalists were nudging and framing and pushing their cause like highly gifted amateur psychologists. Their interventions seem to have changed behavior by altering beliefs, norms and preferences, but because psychological interventions are often coarse, inadvertent, offsetting side effects occur. After discussing the interplay between environmental preference-making and economics, I turn to three areas where strong, simple views have spread—electric cars, recycling and local conservation efforts. In all three areas, environmental rules of thumb can lead to significant, adverse environmental side effects. Local environmentalism, for example, may increase carbon emissions by pushing development from low emission areas, like coastal California, to high emissions areas elsewhere. I end by discussing how economic analysis of the political market for ideas can make sense of the remarkable disparity of views on global warming. |
| JEL: | Q0 Q5 |
| Date: | 2013–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:19359&r=res |
| By: | Yang, Zhenzeng |
| Abstract: | I use cross-country panel data to show that strengthening of private property rights protection lowers pollution emission intensity. The finding is robust to the inclusion of many controls and use of different independent variables. This paper provides preliminary empirical evidence for property rights theory of environmental goods, and suggests that completely specifying property rights is an important approach to response to environmental degradation. |
| Keywords: | Private Property Rights, Pollution, Emerging Market, CO2 Emission |
| JEL: | Q28 Q56 |
| Date: | 2013–07–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:48717&r=res |